A/N: I actually wrote this like...several months ago. Like, February. Yeah. It's been on deviantART for a while now, I just now got around to posting it here. Enjoy this bit of sheer random WTF-ery.
Disclaimer: I do not own Fruits Basket or any of its characters. They belong to Natsuki Takaya, for she is awesome. I am but a simple (deranged) fan.
Chapter 1
Momiji, Kyo, Haru, and Yuki were on the beach, minding their own business. All the boys except for the caffiene-fueled rabbit were tired and decided to rest.
"Aw, come on!" he pleaded. "Why are you going to sleep now?!"
"'Cuz we've gotta put up with you, that's why," Kyo replied. It was just plain unnatural for a boy his age to be that overly energetic ALL THE TIME!!
"Aw," he said, "pleeeeease? We can make a sandcastle!" He was tugging on Kyo's wrist.
"I said no, you little squirt!" Kyo repeated, pulling his hand free and smacking Momiji in the back of the head.
"WAAAH! KYO'S HITTING ME!"
The cat rolled his eyes and groaned, then lay down on his towel.
"I'd be glad to," Yuki said, "but you probably wouldn't have as much fun with me lagging behind..."
"Okay, Yuki!" Momiji said cheerfully. (Here, Kyo would have protested, "Why aren't you buggin' him?!" ...but he had already fallen asleep.)
"Hey, Momiji, I'll play with you," Haru said.
"Yay! You wanna make a sandcastle?"
"Nah. I've got a better idea..." the ox told him.
"What? What is it?" Momiji asked eagerly.
"A little game I like to call, 'Fun With Sunscreen'."
"How do you play?" inquired the wide-eyed rabbit.
"Well, you and I are awake. Kyo and Yuki are asleep. We take sunscreen. We write things on them. It's quite simple, really," Haru explained.
"That doesn't seem like much fun," Momiji replied, confused.
"Ah, but the fun comes later, my friend. We write on them, then Mr. Sun does his work, then we sit back and watch the hilarity unfold..."
"Ooh," he said. "So what happens if they wake up before you're done?"
"Well, I've done this before, so I think I can do this without waking either of them...And I do know Kyo's kind of a heavy sleeper, so I doubt this'd be enough to wake him..."
"So are you gonna take Yuki or Kyo?" Momiji asked.
"I'll take Yuki," Haru said.
"Okay!" he exclaimed, running over to the sleeping Kyo. He sat there for a few minutes, deep in thought. What to write, what to write, he wondered.
Haru, however, knew exactly what he was going to do to Yuki. The rat was sound asleep, and Haru smiled. He poured some sunscreen onto his hand, dipped his finger in it, and wrote 'I LOVE HARU' in large letters across Yuki's back.
Meanwhile, Momiji had learned something new about Kyo: he talked in his sleep. So Momiji, being Momiji, got distracted and tried to guess what his orange-haired cousin was dreaming about. Finally beating Yuki, maybe? Then, suddenly, he heard Kyo mutter something that sounded a lot like 'Tohru'.
"That's it!" he said, snapping his fingers. He then proceeded to repeat the process he'd watched Haru do, but instead of writing his own name, Momiji wrote 'I LOVE TOHRU'. Also, he had to write it on Kyo's stomach, as he was lying on his back. He was surprised to see that Haru had been right about the cat being a heavy sleeper. He also remembered that Kyo wasn't really ticklish either (he learned that the hard way. Trying to tickle him in the past had only gotten him slapped).
(later)
Kyo opened his eyes, then shut them again because the sun was shining directly in his face. He could feel an irritating stinging sensation, and he could tell without looking that he had gotten a sunburn. He sat up, wincing a little. He remembered that he had forgotten to put on sunscreen before he had fallen asleep. Which confused him even more when he noticed the bottle next to him. Then he glanced down at his stomach to see how bad the burn was...
"Ah, crap..." he said under his breath, then yelled, "MOMIJI!"
"Yes?" the younger Sohma replied innocently. Haru sat nearby, trying (and failing) to keep a straight face.
"Would you care to explain," Kyo growled, "how THIS got here?"
"Um..." Momiji struggled to find an answer. "Well, if it makes you feel any better, Haru got Yuki, and his was bigger..."
He looked past Momiji to see Yuki, who was still asleep, and couldn't help but laugh at what he saw (apparently, Haru had still had some excess sunscreen after he'd written the 'I LOVE HARU' part, and decided to surround it with several smaller hearts).
The rat got up slowly--very slowly, because he got burned too.
"Did I forget to put on sunscreen?" he wondered aloud.
"I put some on you when you were asleep," Haru replied, trying (and again, failing) to hide the huge grin on his face.
"What are you smiling about?"
"Oh, nothing...you just looked so peaceful when you were asleep..."
Suddenly, Kakeru appeared randomly. Yuki was just putting his shirt back on, so his friend didn't see what was on his back.
"Hiya, Yun-yun!" he said, slapping him on the back.
"Ah! Watch it, will you?" Yuki told him. "I got burned really bad..."
"Oh, sorry," Kakeru replied. "You want me to take a look at it, see how bad it is?"
"It's not like you'll listen to me if I say no anyway..." Yuki replied as, sure enough, Kakeru lifted up the back of his shirt. By this time, Haru had finally just said "Screw it" to attempting to restrain himself, and was now doubled over in hysterical laughter.
"Well?" Yuki asked. "How bad does it look?"
"AWW, YUN-YUN! I NEVER KNEW!" Kakeru exclaimed. "Why are you keeping these things from me? I'm your buddy, aren't I?"
"What, dare I ask, are you talking about?" Yuki asked. Then he noticed Haru dying of laughter and realized. "He wrote something on my back with the sunblock, didn't he?"
"Looks that way," he said, grinning. Yuki put his face in his hands.
"Why, Haru?" he asked. "Why do you do these things to me?"
Haru said nothing; he just smiled.
Meanwhile, Kyo was packing his things, as they were getting ready to leave. The material of his shirt against his skin made his sunburn sting like hell, but he didn't want anyone (let alone Tohru) to see what that annoying rabbit had done to him. Not that it wasn't true; he did sorta have a thing for Tohru. He just knew it would be really awkward to have to explain to her why he had decided to display those feelings, with sunscreen of all things, on his belly, of all places. On top of that, telling her that Momiji had basically ambushed him in his sleep would have been even more embarrassing. So as painful as it was, he'd decided to keep it covered until they got home where he could get something to relieve the burning.
Finally, when Shigure came to pick them up (well, Hatori actually drove), they got in the car.
"So, did you boys have fun today?" Shigure asked.
Momiji and Haru stifled laughter, while Yuki and Kyo scowled.
"Go ahead, Yuki," Haru said. "Show them the fun we had."
"Um, I can't, Haru. It's ON MY BACK!"
"On your back?" Shigure asked. "Oh...the old sunblock prank! Aaya and I used to do that all the time in high school. Remember, Hatori?"
"Ugh, yes," the doctor replied.
"We got Kyo too!" Momiji said. He tried to show Shigure his handiwork, but he couldn't because Kyo had his arms crossed over his shirt and was holding it down by the hem.
"Come on, Kyo, move your arms!" he said, poking him in the side repeatedly. This did get Kyo to move his hand...but to smack him.
"WAAH!" the rabbit cried. "KYO HIT ME!"
"Kyo, no violence in this car!" Shigure said.
Hatori scowled. If he hadn't been focusing on the road, he would have turned around to face Yuki and Kyo and said, "I feel your pain."
The older two Sohma boys in the back seat tried to ignore the burning, irritating discomfort and focus on other things. Both of them desperately wanted to go home, but for slightly different reasons. Yuki mainly just wanted relief from the excruciating pain. Kyo did too, but he also wanted to see Tohru. Her smiling face being there to welcome him home would help him forget the little fiasco of the day...that is, until his sunburn would remind him again. Then his mind drifted back to thinking how painfully awkward it would be if she found out about the aforementioned fiasco. And that would back him into a corner and he would have no choice but to tell her that he did, in fact, love her.
"Yuki, are you okay?" Haru asked. "You're being kinda quiet. Is something wrong?"
Yuki shook his head. His mind, like Kyo's, was elsewhere. He was thinking about what Haru had graffitied (sp?) on his back. Although he had adamantly denied it in the past, he got to thinking...maybe it was a little bit true...if he were to be perfectly honest with himself, he did feel that way, if only just the slightest bit. But there was no way he would let anybody know about that. At least until he was sure with himself...
Neither of the two boys snapped out of their thoughts until the car doors slammed shut, leading them to realize that they were home.
